"Uncle Noah!"
Ling Yan, who was most familiar with Noah, still recognized the last person to appear, even in such darkness.
The corpses gradually surrounded them. Controlled by evil spirits, they couldn't enter the area of red quicksand, but they could form a circle outside to block any retreat.
"What should we do?"
Sister Olivia looked at Anna in panic, only to find that the person who had been making decisions was now shaking with her head covered.
A terrible headache.
Anna felt as if a spoon was stirring randomly inside her brain. She was dizzy, and it was taking all her strength to grit her teeth and not scream. She had no time to think about their current situation.
But... is this an attack by an evil spirit?
Anna could no longer tell if her wound had worsened or if she was under attack. She knew Joseph's pen was still in her arms. If ghosts other than the mirror ghost could attack her, did it mean her judgment was wrong?
At that moment, her arms suddenly tightened as Ling Yan and Wyatt grabbed her, one on each side, rushing forward with Sister Olivia close behind. The instant they burst out of the red quicksand circle, a strong wind blew, and a dark shadow swayed faintly outside the window. The surrounding corpses pounced on them like zombies unleashed from a cage!
"Sister Olivia! Take Anna to the basement!"
Ling Yan raised her hand and tore open the painful memory. As the notebook pages shattered, the terrifying phenomena around her paused simultaneously. Shrill ghost cries emanated from outside the window, the corridor, the ceiling, and every other conceivable corner. For a moment, it was impossible to tell how many vengeful spirits were entrenched there.
Sister Olivia seized the opportunity to catch her breath and dragged Anna to the second floor. Ling Yan leaped forward, snatching the Bagua wooden sword from Noah, while Wyatt prepared his shotgun.
"Ah!"
"Let's go!"
A gunshot roared, and the powerful impact of the close-range shotgun fire smashed the head of a corpse. Then, the two of them fled, leaving the dangerous place.
Meanwhile, Sister Olivia took Anna and opened the laboratory passage according to their previous instructions. Just then, Anna fainted. Sister Olivia pulled off a bedsheet, wrapped Anna in it, and slowly carried her down to the underground. She didn't relax until she entered the blood-soaked wooden door.
Relighting the candle, Sister Olivia carefully surveyed her surroundings. Although the laboratory still emanated an eerie feeling, it offered a sense of security compared to the chaos outside. She looked at Anna, unconscious on the ground. Anna's face was pale, and her forehead and arms were abnormally cold. Sister Olivia carefully checked Anna's condition, finding that the bandage on her head was long soaked with blood and sweat.
"It's so cold... and yet you're still sweating."
Sister Olivia muttered to herself, trying to bolster her courage. She tore off another bedsheet, helped Anna up, and planned to unwrap and rewrap her, but then realized Anna's breathing was growing weaker.
"Hey, hey! Don't die!"
Panic seized Sister Olivia. She quickly removed the cloth and re-wrapped Anna with the bedsheet, but beyond that, she couldn't think of anything else to do.
Suddenly, an idea flashed through her mind.
Sister Olivia reached out a trembling hand, fumbled in Anna's arms, and pulled out Joseph's pen.
"I... I don't want to die..."
After a moment of hesitation, Sister Olivia put the pen back.
"...But, but you're dying. I'll wait until you die before taking it, which is still fair to you..."
She hesitated for a long time, taking it out and putting it back several times, before finally making up her mind.
"Sorry, Anna, I don't want to take it from you... But in this situation, I can only think about myself."
...
The painful memory lasted for only a short time. In less than half an hour, the fixed ghost quietly began to move again.
Ling Yan and Wyatt were disoriented in the darkness. As the sky grew darker, the two could only try to stay close together, but they didn't know where to go.
"Hey!"
A call suddenly came from the darkness.
Ling Yan instinctively turned back to use her mobile phone as a flashlight and immediately saw half of a hideous, terrifying ghost face.
In an instant, she raised the wooden sword, ready to stab, but the person with the ghost face quickly took two steps back and shouted, "Don't! I'm Beom Seok!"
Hearing this, Ling Yan paused, and Wyatt's mobile phone also shone over. As the light grew a little brighter, the two saw that it was indeed Beom Seok in front of them — but he had changed.
His once handsome face was now covered on the entire left half with protruding blood vessels, like earthworms clinging to his skin. A terrifying thing was that these protrusions were still slowly wriggling as if something alive was moving inside.
This was even scarier than before.
"You... how did you become like this?"
Ling Yan hastily slashed Beom Seok twice with the wooden sword, signaling him to keep his distance.
Beom Seok couldn't help but smile bitterly at their reaction. The other half of his face was still normal, otherwise he might not even recognize himself, so it was no wonder the two reacted this way.
"I let my ghost possess me. Now I have some of the power of evil spirits and can protect you — where's Anna? Where's Uncle Noah? Where did they go?"
Wyatt shook his head. Ling Yan said, "We're separated. We can't trust you in your current state... Isn't there any risk in being possessed by an evil ghost?"
"I would die if I didn't let it possess me... It's hard to explain. Anyway, we have to find the others as soon as possible. Now I can see the location of the ghosts. I can't describe the vision. You can only rely on me now. At night, it's simply the kingdom of ghosts. If you run a little longer, something might happen."
"Are you... trustworthy?" Ling Yan was still very cautious.
Beom Seok had no choice but to spread his hands: "Now I'm half-human and half-ghost. The wooden sword in your hand is also effective against me. If you're worried, you can monitor me."
"...Okay, let's go to the laboratory."
There was no time to delay. Ling Yan had to remain vigilant, and the three of them returned to the main house under Beom Seok's guidance.
The bodies gathered in the hall had disappeared, leaving only glaring blood and flesh on the ground. Beom Seok was leading the way, and they could imagine what had happened before seeing the scene in the room.
"Where have you been?" Ling Yan couldn't help but ask. "We were all waiting for you, but you didn't come back until it was almost dark, and now you look like this..."
"I went to the greenhouse," Beom Seok smiled bitterly, walking up the stairs to the second floor, having to explain to Ling Yan and Wyatt. "I was chased by two ghosts. Although the summoned evil ghost could deal with one, it couldn't protect me. Just when I thought it was over, my evil ghost sent me a message..."
This evil ghost could merge with a human soul, thereby transferring power to the human body. Doing so naturally had side effects. If the fusion state wasn't released within a certain period, the evil spirit would kill Beom Seok's soul and occupy his body. But at that critical moment, Beom Seok could no longer care about such risks.
—"We must go back alive."
That was not only the agreement made by the remaining nine people the day before, but also the promise he had made to his dead brothers in his heart.
Even if he became a ghost.
The secret passage was opened again, and the three walked cautiously towards the laboratory.
The candlelight behind the door at the end brought a little peace of mind. Ling Yan whispered, "Anna, Sister Olivia, we're here," then pushed the door open.
On the floor of the outermost room, a bedsheet covered a person. This way of covering the entire body made the three feel uneasy. Beom Seok immediately squatted down and lifted the bedsheet, revealing a body lying on its back with blood flowing from all seven orifices.
It was Sister Olivia.
"She's been dead for a while," Beom Seok concluded, reaching out to feel the body's skin. Ling Yan and Wyatt exchanged glances and immediately rushed into the inner room.
But Anna wasn't there either.
"What the hell!"
Beom Seok felt a headache when he heard Ling Yan say that Anna wasn't there either. Sister Olivia's murder meant that this place wasn't safe either, but how could Anna have run away? Regardless of whether she was conscious or not, she should still be here.
"Wait! There seems to be a message here!"
After lighting up the room, Ling Yan suddenly found a message written with some materials under the corner of the middle ritual room.
[ I have left, and I cannot stay here for long - Anna. ]
The handwriting was hurried and sloppy. For convenience, he hadn't even had time to write his complicated name. It looked like he left in a hurry. Out of their consistent trust in Anna, the three who saw this line of words didn't think much and immediately ran to the door.
Unfortunately, a cloud of black smoke had blocked the door. Although the black fog ghost didn't dare to approach the blood-soaked wooden door, it could block this narrow passage.
"Oops!"
"Get out of the way!"
Two shouts came from the front and back. Beom Seok had been pulled over by Ling Yan's shoulder and pushed past. With a swing of the wooden sword, he stabbed into the black fog. There was no scream this time. The black fog just shrank back quickly and retreated a little, but it still blocked the road.
"Get out of the way!"
Ling Yan didn't stop and stabbed several more times with the sword, forcing the black fog to retreat again and again. He actually rushed into the passage with this momentum. Beom Seok and Wyatt followed immediately, but unexpectedly, at that moment, the candlelight behind them went out instantly.
"What's going on!"
Suddenly losing the light, even though Beom Seok now had ghost vision in one eye, he still fell into a moment of panic. In contrast, Wyatt, the old soldier, wasn't in a hurry. He jammed his shotgun into the blood-soaked wooden door and reached out to turn on the flashlight on his mobile phone to provide lighting for the front. But at this moment—
"Invisible ghost!" Beom Seok's roar echoed in the passage.
At this time, Ling Yan had already stabbed the Black Mist Ghost with several consecutive sword strikes, forcing him to retreat far away. Hearing Beom Seok's roar, he immediately turned back to support him. Seeing this, Beom Seok rushed over and pushed Ling Yan down. A few wisps of black smoke passed over their heads, almost catching Ling Yan.
Bang!
The blood-soaked wooden door made a loud noise, and Wyatt, who was holding the door, was knocked away by a huge force and smashed directly against the wall, immediately spitting out two mouthfuls of blood. Immediately after a second loud noise, the blood-soaked wooden door shattered with a bang, and heavy footsteps stepped out from the door. Wyatt turned over and fired a shot, and a two-meter-tall human figure was blasted out of the air with flames and gunpowder!
Blocked from the front and back!